Photo Books

I've been meaning to share this since I started the blog - but it keeps slipping my mind as each new craft, DIY and cleaning project comes up.

Since it's the new year and I'm about to start my 2013 album, I thought I'd pass along this idea to you…

Photo books!

Nothing new, nothing novel - a million-and-one different companies do them - but SO important if you want to ever see the photos you have taken.

Let's be honest, how often do you surf back in your computer's hard drive to review last year or the year before?

You take the photo, you look and smile, and then you forget they're there.

Unless you have a coffee table book out where you can flip through anytime.
One guests can see (if you want), and one that you can even create copies of to give to grandparents etc.

I'm a HUGE Apple fan - and the ease of creating their photo books is just one reason why.

Simply go to iPhoto, click "Create", "Book" and then select from the various options.

Hard cover, soft cover, large, small, colour etc.

 One of the many perks of this program is that it gives you a preview of the cover on all of the different styles of books, and you can "auto-fill" the insides - meaning you don't have to place each photo in individually if you don't want.

iPhoto will create the entire book for you!

I've tried a few different versions over the past few years and I think I like the larger sized hardcovers.

You can put an inscription inside the front cover:

and you can choose how many and/or few photos you want on each page:

 You can vary the colours of the pages to follow a certain theme, and you can put captions on each photo, or a single one on the bottom of each page.

These ones made me laugh - A shaving cream pie to the face for Wayne during our neighbourhood "Olympics", and below - Madison tying Chloe's hat to her head so it wouldn't blow off.
Too funny!

 And they are small and compact so you can leave them on a coffee table, or on a bookshelf - with a custom spine title so they stand out.

Each of these books have about 700 photos inside and are less than an inch thick!

You can also make tiny "brag books" (3 books for $12) like the one I carry around in my purse here.

This year's might be a bit thinner as I lost all of our photos on our hard drive back in November (UGH!).

So, I guess I should remind you to not only make the books, but to also back up your hard drive regularly… which I also learned the hard way.

Have a great one!